Chapter 95 – The Crown of Ash and Blood
The Forge did not echo like a chamber of stone.
It screamed.
The moment Caedren's blade struck Thalen's, the entire cavern trembled—stones above shifted like ribs inhaling flame, and shadows scattered like hunted spirits. The ancient metal and fire of the mountain stirred as if recognizing the sound of war once more. Sparks flew where their swords met, and each impact shook dust from the vaulted ceilings, revealing murals long hidden—depictions of kings long dead, battles long lost, choices long buried.
Steel rang like prophecy.
Blood followed like law.
They were no longer men.
They were ends.
Thalen moved like a dancer carved from lightning. Every strike of his twin sabers sought to tear not just flesh but belief from Caedren's bones. His style was Ivan's—refined, absolute, meant to kill swiftly and with meaning. The sabers were not just weapons. They were arguments, final words, the last syllables of an old oath.
But Caedren was not swift.
He was inevitable.
His blade was heavier, forged in the ruins of Fallowmere, tempered by loss and betrayal. His movements were slower—but anchored by weight. The weight of grief. The weight of memory. The weight of knowing that he did not fight for a crown, or even a future.
He fought to deny a lie its final breath.
With every blow he gave ground, he gave pain—and pain he turned to purpose.
Thalen's sabers kissed his ribs, slit the air before his eyes.
Caedren responded by slamming the flat of his blade into Thalen's face—shattering bone, splitting skin. The sound echoed like the shatter of stained glass. Thalen staggered, blood pouring from his cheek.
And laughed through the red.
"You're still just the boy in the snow," he hissed. "Still waiting for someone to tell you who you are."
Caedren didn't answer.
Instead, he drove his shoulder into Thalen's gut, lifting him from the ground, slamming him against the anvil-shaped altar beneath the crown. Stone cracked. The crown trembled.
Thalen lashed out with a knife from his boot—caught Caedren's thigh. A hot flare of agony. Caedren grunted, staggered.
Then brought his elbow down—again, again, again—on Thalen's face until his brother's nose was pulp and the sneer silenced. Blood smeared across the altar like a broken seal.
The crown pulsed.
It wanted blood.
It fed on it.
It remembered the shape of kings.
Thalen hurled Caedren backward with a desperate kick.
He rose, face torn, one eye sealed shut, sabers dripping. "I bled for Ivan! I bled for the dream! You? You just inherited ashes!"
Caedren pushed himself up, limping, each movement fire and will.
"You bled," he said quietly. "But you never grieved."
There was a flicker in Thalen's expression—then it was gone.
Then Caedren charged.
Their blades met once.
Twice.
Then—
Caedren dropped his sword.
Thalen struck at the opening.
Too fast.
Too certain.
And Caedren caught the blade in his bare hand.
It split his palm.
Metal to bone.
But he held it.
Pulled Thalen in.
And with his other hand, drove his dagger into Thalen's heart.
The sound was not of death.
It was of silence.
Thalen's breath caught. A cough. A shudder. His knees buckled.
"Still... not enough," he whispered, blood slipping from his lips.
"I know," Caedren said, lowering him to the floor.
"I know."
Thalen reached for something—maybe a hand, maybe the crown.
He died before he found it.
Silence fell like judgment.
The Forge grew still.
Thalen's body lay beneath the crown, limbs sprawled like a broken promise. The blood soaked into the stone, and the altar drank deep, as if this death were expected. Required.
But Caedren did not touch the crown.
Not yet.
He knelt beside Thalen, breathing hard, the wound in his hand still open, still weeping. He looked down at the face of the friend who had once dragged him from a river, who had once shared bread beneath stars, who had once sworn an oath to protect the world.
He felt nothing.
He felt everything.
He looked at the crown, glowing black-gold like the first ember of war, and it no longer felt like a prize.
It felt like a confession.
And he said:
"You are not my destiny.
You are my burden."
And placed it on his head.
The mountain wept fire.
And the Forge screamed again.
Not in fury.
But in recognition.
The ancient runes along the walls ignited. The murals lit with memory. The names of those who had come before flared into sight—kings, tyrants, martyrs, all of them bound by the weight of this one act.
Outside, the Iron Gate shattered.
Lysa and Tarn turned in alarm as smoke poured from the mountain. The sky above twisted with flame and storm, clouds moving as if recoiling from the decision made beneath them.
And from the fire and ruin, stepped Caedren.
Bleeding.
Broken.
Crowned.
His armor was torn, his hand wrapped in blood-soaked cloth, the crown resting on his brow like a wound turned to steel. The mark of the Hollow Son blazed across his chest, a brand reforged.
His eyes were no longer hollow.
They were burning.
With memory.
And war.